Man believed clinic performed abortions

A Michigan man described as a bookworm by relatives has wandered
the Midwest since August, looking for a medical clinic to attack
with his 2004 Saturn compact car, authorities said.

It was dawn Monday when David Robert McMenemy approached
Edgerton Women’s Health Center in Davenport, which he mistakenly
believed provided abortions.

He entered the center’s driveway off East Rusholme Street and
then took a few moments to turn and configure the car to face
straight into the lobby, Davenport Fire Marshal Mike Hayman
said.

The 45-year-old crashed the Saturn into the central lobby,
coming to rest at the counter. When the car did not immediately
burst into flames as he may have expected, police said he took
gasoline that he had poured into a Gatorade bottle and spread it
over the interior. “I lit it,” McMenemy told investigators, and he
exited the structure to surrender himself to startled Davenport
firefighters.

“He came out and said to our guys, ‘There’s no one in the
vehicle, and that’s my car. I did it,’ ” Hayman related. “Our
commander on the scene was very surprised, and he took McMenemy to
a squad car and turned him over to police.”

The health center would have been destroyed if its sprinkler
system hadn’t activated, police reported. Damage estimates were not
available late Tuesday.

McMenemy, listed at 6-foot-5 and 270 pounds, remains in the
Scott County Jail.

He made a preliminary appearance in court on Tuesday morning,
and the judge decided not to set bail because the resident of Wayne
County, Mich., is considered a flight risk and is likely to
reoffend, Scott County Attorney Bill Davis said, adding that
McMenemy has no apparent ties to Davenport.

McMenemy has had no criminal record for 10 years or more, at
least not in Michigan, according to a clerk in the criminal
division of the Wayne County Clerk’s office in Detroit. He also has
no prior conviction in Iowa, according to www.iowacourts.state.ia.us.

Thanks for being a subscriber.

Sorry, your subscription does not include this content.

He faces a charge of second-degree arson because first-degree
arson requires that the building be occupied. There are no
additional charges that are appropriate, including terrorism, Davis
said, but he noted the case could be taken up by federal
authorities.

McMenemy is described as “laid back” and a “bookworm,” a woman
who identified herself as his niece in Sterling Heights, Mich.,
told Lourdes Duarte, a reporter for Fox 2 News in Detroit. The
niece described McMenemy as her favorite uncle and noted this is
not normal behavior for him.

He took his car and left the Detroit suburbs some months ago and
the family hasn’t seen him since, Duarte said she was told.

The Edgerton facility started in 1972 as Maternal Health Center
in Bettendorf and moved to the Davenport location in 2002. It does
not perform abortions and also does not provide abortion referrals,
according to Tom Fedje, facility president. It does advise
low-income and underprivileged pregnant women on various options
available to them.

The incident is being monitored by Planned Parenthood of Greater
Iowa, owner of the Bettendorf clinic that does provide abortion
services in the Quad-Cities.

“We are committed to keeping our patients and staff safe,” said
spokeswoman Kathi Di Nicola, Des Moines. “We have a
state-of-the-art security system, and we work with area
police.”

Davenport firefighters were also aware that Monday’s incident
was an eerie reminder of the 9/11 attacks in 2001.

“It was certainly on our minds, but I’m not sure that McMenemy
even knew what day it was,” Hayman said.